The heroes of the two previous novels in Cormac McCarthy's border trilogy return together in this one. John Grady Cole (from All the pretty horses) is still a young man whereas Billy Parham (The Crossing) is somewhat older--both working on a ranch near the New Mexico-Mexico border near the border cities of El Paso and Ciudad Jaurez.

The story's main thread is developed around Cole's falling in love with a teenage Mexican prostitute--Magdalena and his attempting to bring her back over the border to marry her. Her Mexican brothel keepers/protectors have much different ideas about someone(thing) they consider their property. As in the previous two novels of this trilogy the novels denouement revolves around the clash between two different cultures living right on each others doorsteps. John recruits Billy Parham to act as a kind of go between between himself and the brothelkeepers (Eduardo and Tiburcio) but they're only interested in discouraging this liason. John then turns to an older Mexican he's met--a blind man but he cannot help him. He is in love though and cannot be stopped from the course he is on which only leads us to the books tragic and bloody climax.

Though not quite as good as The Crossing--this is a simpler and shorter story and it plays to McCarthy's strengths as a writer. A little less concentrated in style than other works of his--the prose is clearer and more lucid. McCarthy is very economical in his dialogue and is one if not just about the best writer of action scenes in the United States today. Many writers would have turned this kind of material into a tearjerker but McCarthy maintains a very tight control over his story and the vision of where to go with it. The whole series is very enjoyable and well worth reading --at least IMO and I expect that within the next couple of years I may have read all his books. I look very much forward to his next. ( )

3697. Cities of the Plain Volume Three The Border Trilogy, by Cormac McCarthy (read 10 Feb 2003) I read volume one of this trilogy, All the Pretty Horses, on 21 Sept 1996, with some appreciation so I read on 27 Dec 1996 volume two, The Crossing. I so disliked that I said I need not read anything further, but now I have read the final volume. This was more readable than The Crossing, with some exciting parts, e.g., a roundup of sheep-killing dogs and a vicious bloody knife fight. There is a pretentious abstruse Epilogue, but except for that the book is not bad reading. The Spanish dialogue, untranslated, annoys--would it have been so terrible to have footnotes translate it? And it would be nice to have standard punctuation, but I suppose that is asking too much... ( )